The Week ahead

Today, we expect to reach a political deal on the next long-term EU budget (MFF) and the planned Recovery Fund. The EU Member States want to drastically cut the planned budget. In doing so, they are jeopardising long-standing EU policies and new priorities. The EPP Group does not agree with this. We want more money for flagship EU programmes on the climate, the digital transition, health, youth, culture, infrastructure, research, border protection and solidarity. Negotiators of the European Parliament, EU Member States and the European Commission meet this morning.

On Monday evening, the Budgets and Economy & Monetary Affairs Committees will vote on the rules of the new €672.5 billion Recovery and Resilience Facility. Europe will not leave any person or country behind in this pandemic, but there must be conditions for Member States to use the Recovery Fund. We do not want the Recovery Fund to be used simply to fill in holes in national budgets. There must be a link to the European Semester and a macroeconomic conditionality. The fund is for investments, not for political populism.

Extremists who spread violence and terrorist propaganda via social media must be stopped. We need to get terrorism and radicalisation off the internet. For this, the EU should adopt a new law allowing the removal of terrorist online propaganda much faster than in the past. The law was already proposed by the European Commission more than two years ago but has been blocked by Socialists and Greens in the European Parliament. In light of the recent terrorist attacks, it is once again clear that more must be done. Parliament's plenary will debate the latest terror attacks on Wednesday and the next round of negotiations of the law with the Council is scheduled to take place on Thursday. 

On Thursday, the Plenary will debate and vote on the EU’s upgraded health programme, the so-called EU4Health Programme. The EPP Group wants to restore the ambitious €9.4 billion funding originally planned for it. This is what we want the programme to do: upgrade the healthcare systems in EU Member States, train more health staff, promote medical excellence, reduce health inequalities across Europe, support digitalisation in the healthcare sector, finance a masterplan against cancer and bring back the production of medicines to Europe.

To draw lessons from the current pandemic, the European Commission will propose a law package on Wednesday to better prepare Europe for future health threats. The EPP Group welcomes that amongst others, cross-border cooperation will be made easier and the competences of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) will be strengthened.

On Thursday, the European Parliament will discuss the transparency of the purchase of and access to COVID-19 vaccines. The EPP Group believes that faced with the serious health crisis, EU Member States must continue to work as a team. This is not the time for vaccine nationalism!

Under the EPP Group's leadership, the European Parliament set up a Special Committee on Beating Cancer. At a public hearing on Thursday, the committee will discuss ways to support research on cancer, also within the biggest EU research and innovation programme, Horizon Europe.

The reciprocal EU-China Agreement seeks to protect 100 European Geographical Indications (GIs) in China and 100 Chinese GIs in the EU against imitation and usurpation. The EU list of products to be protected includes goods such as Bayerisches Bier, Greek Feta, Queso Manchego, Champagne, Gorgonzola and Polska Wódka. It is a positive step that will boost EU exports of high-quality products to China, which is already the EU's third largest destination for agrifood exports, and will protect our business from fraud. Parliament's plenary will approve the agreement on Thursday.

MEPs will elect a new Parliament Vice-President on Thursday morning to replace the EPP Group's Mairead McGuinness, who was appointed European Commissioner for Financial Stability, Financial Services and the Capital Markets Union on 12 October. The EPP Group has nominated Roberta Metsola for the post.